Sailing For Port
by RionahAnha
Summary: Everything that Sam is, that Sam might be, that Sam could and will be depends on him. Dean isn't sure, as he never is, whether or not he is the right man for the job. The one reassurance he has is that Sam seems to think he is. DeAged Sam. Rated T for language.


**Disclaimer: **_I wish._

_For those of you have continued to review. favorite, follow, and express interest in these stories- thank you! I hope each of you will continue to read, enjoy, and provide feedback! {Reviews make my hearts sing!}_

Sam at four and a half had been cute. Sam at five had been cute, but a little louder, a little more outgoing. Sam at six is a terror.

Dean gets the first phone call the second day of first grade. He's at work, has been for two and a half hours, and he has to clock out and drive the three blocks to the school, where Sam is waiting in the nurse's office, pressing a bloody towel to his eyebrow and blubbering. It's a ten minute process, trying to talk to the nurse, trying to get Sammy to calm down, trying to staunch the incredible flow of blood. He doesn't even get the full story until they're on their way back from the clinic on Hoopler Street, where the doctor puts six stitches above Sammy's right eyebrow, with promises that scarring would be minimal. Sam sits in the Impala's front seat and sucks determinately on the lollipop the nurse gave him. His face is already swelling, turning blue over the cut, forcing his eye lid closed. Dean doesn't tell him, but he sort of looks like that white Orc from the Lord of the Rings, in a much cuter kind of way.

"I didn't mean to, Dean," Sammy says honestly. "I guess I'm too fat to do that, huh?"

Sammy's not fat in the slightest. He's the smallest kid in his class. Dean sighs and makes him promise not to try anymore classroom gymnastics.

"Desks are for sitting, Sammy, not head stands," he reprimands, and Sam nods seriously, his lips blue with sugar.

"Okie dokie, Dean-o," he says.

They get the stitches out a week and a half later. Sam's eye stays swollen a few days longer. He complains about headaches and Dean ends every night in Sammy's bed, holding an ice pack to his little brother's head while Sam drifts to sleep.

After the headstand stunt, Sam gives up his dream of being a world class gymnast and decides to become a wrestler. Dean gets a note from his teacher this time, something about headlocks in the boy's bathroom and choke holds during recess. Dean curtails Sam's Saturday night WWE.

"Sam, that shit's not real. It's fake. They're trained to do it so they don't hurt anybody."

Sam blinks up at him. He looks so confused that for a minute, Dean feels bad for him. "Sammy, you can't do that sort of stuff to other kids. You're going to hurt them."

"I thought you said it was fake."

"It is. On T.V." Dean signs the note, tucks it back into Sam's homework folder. "Make sure your teacher gets this, okay? And stop choking the other boys."

Sam doesn't stop. Two days later Dean finds himself sitting awkwardly in a chair that is much too small for him, across from a very irritated first grade teacher, who doesn't seem to understand why Sam doesn't seem to understand that pile driving his friends off of the merry-go-round is not an acceptable sort of way to behave. Dean, for his credit, sort of doesn't understand why Sam doesn't get it either, especially since he told him to knock it off, so despite how much he hates it, he rips into Sam as soon as they get in the car.

"I told you to cut that shit out, Sam."

Sam scowls at his knees. "It's just a game, Dean-"

"It isn't a game. You hurt that kid, Sam. You think that's a game? You think that's funny?"

"Dean-"

"I mean it, Sam. Knock it off." He throws the Impala into gear, pulls out of the parking lot. He glances over at Sam, catches sight of _that _look, that fight-picking, not-listening look Sammy sometimes has. He steels himself for the onslaught. "You're not watching that stuff anymore, Sam."

Sam hits the roof. It's his favorite show, he's going to be a wrestler, how is he supposed to learn if he can't even watch-

"Pick a new career, Sam," Dean says grimly. "This one's over for you."

Acrobatics and wrestling are out, so Sammy turns to baseball. He spends his afternoons throwing balls against the garage wall and chasing them back amongst the cactus patches. Dean spends his evenings picking thorny spikes out of Sam's arms and legs.

When he's not busy balancing bills or fixing one of the many problems the house has, Dean goes outside and plays catch with Sammy. He doesn't have a glove that fits him, but he can catch the ball with his bare hands, which impresses Sam. He teaches Sam the difference between a curveball and a fastball; he shows Sam how to hold his elbow up when he bats; how to slide to base without face planting. It's all of the stuff his father never taught him, all the things he had to pick up from sports magazines and television games and Bobby. It's incredible, he thinks, that of all of the stuff John did teach them, he left so much other important stuff out.

Sammy loves baseball. He puts the mitt beside his bed when he sleeps and takes to walking around with a purple Diamondbacks ball cap on his head. Dean's not a fan of the Diamondbacks, but everyone else in Arizona is, so he lets Sammy be.

The baseball stage is a far cry better than the acrobat and wrestler stages were, so Dean doesn't really see a need to put limitations on it, until he wakes up one morning to the terrific sound of shattering glass and a crash that shakes the walls. He's out of bed and at Sammy's door in four seconds flat.

Sam's door is locked. Dean jiggles the knob, bangs the flat of his palm against it. "Sam. Sammy! Open up!"

From the other side, Sam's voice warbles. "Wait, wait, hold on, Dean, hold on-"

"Sammy, _now_."

The lock clicks and the door opens to reveal a cringing Sam. Dean sweeps by him on his way in, running his eyes over him for any signs that he might be hurt. There are none. Sam's bedroom window is a beautiful splintered mess on the floor, shards scintillating in the bright morning sun.

Dean has to close his eyes, count to ten twice before he turns to face his little brother. Sammy squares off solemnly, his shoulders straight and his eyes serious. He's being much braver about it, Dean thinks, than he would have been.

He's at a loss. John Winchester ruled his sons through fear and threats. There was a lot of shouting, a lot of demands and little explanations. Sam never really took to that kind of interaction. He still doesn't. So Dean swallows back his anger and says levelly, "You know better, Sam."

Sam flushes. He's embarrassed. He drops his eyes to his feet, twists the hem of his pajama shirt in his hands. "Dean, I didn't mean to."

"What were you thinking, Sam?" Dean doesn't want to think about how much replacing the window is going to cost. He doesn't want to think about what he's going to have cut out of the budget this month. He waits for Sam to answer. When there is no reply forthcoming, he sighs and runs a hand over his chin.

He sends Sam out of the room and is careful to sweep up every piece of glass. He checks and double checks the seams in the wooden floorboards, underneath the bed, and in Sam's toy chest. He wrestles the frame out of the window and wraps it carefully in couple of bed sheets and a garbage bag. He stretches a tarp over the window and nails it carefully shut.

When he is done, he takes Sam's mitt from its place on the bed and carries it into his room, where Sam is sitting cross legged on his bed, looking at a book. He holds the mitt out to Sam, who takes it tentatively.

"No more balls in the house, man," he says, and Sam nods carefully.

"Okay, Dean," he says.

Sam gives up baseball and moves to soccer. He spends his time running around the fenced in backyard, hammering the ball against the porch and the walls and the fences. He comes in sweating and streaked with dirt. He's so tired that most nights he falls asleep before he's even managed to dress himself after he showers, and Dean half the time relents and just lets him sleep in his underwear.

The soccer deal is okay until it isn't. Dean goes out one Saturday, just to the Impala, for three minutes, to get something out of the glove box, and when he comes back inside, Sam is desperately trying to haul the television up off of the floor where he has knocked it. After Dean manages to get it off the floor and back on the stand, after he has plugged it back in and checked to make sure it isn't broken, he takes Sammy's soccer ball and, for good measure, his mitt and baseball and puts them on top of the cabinets in the kitchen. Sam clings to his leg.

"No, no, no, Dean, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, it was an accident-"

"What did I tell you?"

Sam is crying, big tears that squeeze out of his eyes and roll down his cheeks. "Please, Dean, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I won't do it again. I promise, Dean, I promise."

Dean almost gives in. He hates it when Sam cries. Then he remembers the one hundred and thirty two dollars he just shelled out for a new window, and he shakes his head. "Three days, Sammy. You can have them back in three days."

It's a rare occurrence that he has to punish Sam, beyond sending him to his room once in a while and the occasional scolding, so he is mostly unprepared for the meltdown that immediately follows his declaration. Sam cries face down on the floor for twenty two minutes and then falls asleep. When he wakes up his face is puffy and red, but he comes tentatively to where Dean is sitting at the kitchen table and clambers into his lap.

"I'm sorry, Dean," he says softly. He reaches out and fiddles with the buttons on the lapels of Dean's shirt. "I'm sorry. I'll wait for three days. I won't break the rules anymore. I promise."

Dean knows he will. He knows because Sam is a kid and that's what kids do- they break the rules, they test the limits, they grow and learn and eventually even out. It's something, he thinks bitterly, that _he _never got to do, that Sam never really got to do, before. Who they were and what they would be was cast in stone the minute that demon stood over Sam's crib and gazed down at him.

First grade is harder than kindergarten, Sam declares two days away from October. "Harder, but funner," he amends, squinting at Dean in the rearview mirror of the Impala, and Dean doesn't have the heart to tell him that that's not even a real word.

"We're gonna learn to read, Dean," Sam tells him excitedly later that night. He's been bringing home these worksheets every night- colored pictures covered in rounded scrawl, a sheet of paper for every letter of the alphabet. "After we get to Z we're gonna get the ones about putting the sounds together," Sam continues. He's standing gravely at Dean's side, barefoot, his hair drying fluffy after his shower. He holds the tape dispenser out to Dean, who rips off a piece and finishes taping Worksheet T to the kitchen wall. It has, somewhere along the way, become Sam's Wall. A through T, 1 through 13, the Primary Colors and Secondary Colors and anything else that Sam wants to showcase covers it. They don't have a lot of decorations up – they don't really have any extra money for decorations- but this, Dean thinks, looks better than anything Ikea could have supplied.

Sam beams up at it. "I can't wait to read, Dean," he says. He scuttles forward, punches his thumb along the curve of the S worksheet. "This one is for Sam. Yesterday, Mrs. Hobbes got us to stand up because our names start with S. I stood up, and Sue-Anna did, and so did Sebastian." He looks over his shoulder and up, at Dean. "What's your favorite letter, Dean?'

Dean shrugs. He doesn't tell Sammy what he really thinks, that letters are just letters, just a line of worksheets on a kitchen wall. Sam doesn't get that. When you're six, you're required to have favorites of _everything_. "I don't know. W, I guess."

Sam blinks. "For Winchester?" He asks tentatively, then grins when Dean nods. "Know what letter I like, Dean?"

"P? For pain in my ass?"

Sam laughs. He shakes his head, pushes his hair out of his eyes with the heels of his palms. "D," he says, suddenly soft, suddenly shy. "For Dean-o."

Dean blinks, rolls his eyes. "Sammy, you're a wuss," he says, but he makes sure he is laughing, makes sure that Sam is laughing too. He doesn't mind being Sam's favorite. It's a role he's played for twenty nine years; he's not sure who he would be without it.

September in Arizona is only slightly more bearable than August in Arizona. The temperature still climbs past ninety-six every day, and every night they sleep stripped practically naked, windows open and floor fans blowing noisily, hoping vaguely for some kind of relief from the oppression of the desert heat.

The first day of October brings a blessing in the disguise of a torrential thunderstorm. The mercury in the thermometer plummets to an astoundingly cool eighty three degrees, and the air that slips in through the screen winds smells like wet dirt and soft, dewy desert life.

Sam spends the entire morning at Dean's elbow. He can't even turn around without tripping over his white faced little brother, clutching his blue afghan to his chest and looking nervously out the windows, where the sky hangs grey and greenish and low. Every time a roll of thunder peals, he fists his fingers in Dean's jeans and breathes shakily through his mouth.

"Dean, I don't like the storm," he says tearfully at lunch time, and Dean has to stop himself from rolling his eyes.

"Sam, you know the thunder can't hurt you, right?"

"The lightnin' can. Sebastian said his uncle got hit with it'n he fried to a crisp."

Dean chuckles. "Sammy, I think he was kidding."

"He wasn't." Sam glares indignantly at him over the top of the table. "He had t'go to the funeral, Dean. He had to wear a suit."

"Sebastian or his uncle?" Dean jokes, and Sam's glare lengthens, his eyes bright.

"It's not funny, Dean," he says angrily. "We can all _die."_

Dean sobers. He doesn't think back to those times often, but when he does, the memories are sharp and jaded, burned forever into his mind. No matter how old he grows, no matter how fuzzy his memory becomes, he understands that there are some things that will haunt him forever.

The thunder sounds again, and the lights in the house flicker. Sam startles. "Dean-"

"Come here, Sammy." Dean pushes himself out of his chair and bends to haul his brother into his arms. Sam wraps gangly legs around his waist and skinny arms around his neck and buries his face in Dean's shoulder. His ragtag mop of hair tickles Dean's nose. "Wanna see something cool, Sammy?"

Sam nods slowly, hesitantly, and Dean steps across the kitchen to the back door, which he pulls open with one hand. Sam tenses immediately, caving into Dean with sudden hysteria. "Dean, no!"

"It's okay," Dean props open the screen door, steps through. The air under the porch roof is still but cool; Dean's skin, so used to the abuse of the desert heat, prickles in the unfamiliar comfort of it. Sam is crying. "Sammy, it's okay. I just want to show you something."

"Dean, I'm scared." Sam mashes his face into Dean's collarbone as another rumble of thunder breaks against them. "Dean, can we go back inside? Please?"

"I want to show you something, okay?" Dean presses his hand against the back of his brother's head. "Do you trust me?"

Dean knows he does. Slowly, still crying, Sam nods. Dean sinks down to the wooden boards of the porch, his back leaning against the cool metal of the screen door frame, and stretches his legs out flat. He unwinds Sam's arms from his neck and situates his brother in his lap, turning him so he faces out across the back yard and the receding desert plain. Dean is careful to keep Sam's back to his chest. He is trembling, so Dean uses one arm to hold Sammy to him and the other hand to smooth back Sam's hair.

"Keep your eyes open, Sammy," he says quietly. "You have to look for the lightning."

Sam sniffles but does as he is told. Under the porch, they are dry and safe from the pelleting rain, but all around them, the red dirt of their yard turns brackish and dark. The brush that clings to their fence bows under the weight of it; the cactus are green and shiny. Above them, the sky, still that funky green and grey color, is filled with row upon row of heavy clouds, motionless and stolid. The air feels electric, thick; Dean imagines that if he reached out and grabbed at it, it would be solid in his hand. In his arms, Sam whimpers.

"Just wait, Sammy. Tell me when you see the lightning."

They don't have to wait long before the lightning forks, brilliant and purple tinged, at the edge of the mesa, closer to where Dean knows 117 runs past the Barrows ranch. As soon as it creases the sky, Sam gasps; Dean shakes him a little and instructs: "Count Mississippi, Sammy."

Sam throws him a look over his shoulder but does as he's told. "One Miss'ippi, two miss'ippi, three-" He makes it all the way to twenty five before he is drowned out by the answering roar of the thunder.

"What number did you get?" Dean asks him, and Sam turns, buries his face in Dean's chest.

"I wanna go inside-"

"How high did you count, Sam?" Dean asks again, and Sam blinks curiously up at him.

"Twenty five."

"Ok. Divide that by five."

Sam rolls his eyes. "Dean, I'm in first grade. I can't divide."

"Yes, you can. It's easy. Take twenty five and split it up into five parts." Sam's a smart kid. Dean coaches him through the math, using his fingers and Sam's as place holders. Finally, Sam gives a triumphant shout.

"Five!"

"Good boy. You know what that is?"

"What?"

Dean pauses for emphasis, then says solemnly, "That's how many miles away the storm is, Sam." Sam gapes at him in confusion. "Every storm has a center, Sammy- the middle of it where all of the crazy shit happens. You can tell how far away it is by counting the lightning to the thunder and dividing it by five." Sam's beginning to grin. Dean finishes quickly: "Do it again and see if the storm is closer to us or further away."

Sam's fear is gone, melted away into excitement. He wiggles himself forward, plants himself against his older brother's chest, and chatters blithely as he waits for the next streak of lightning. Dean rests his chin on his brother's head and is content to let himself be washed away by the drum of the rain, by the highs and lows of Sam's voice. He shakes off the memories: another storm, another state, standing with his father underneath a leaking motel room awning, teaching another Sammy to count and divide away his fears. Dean pushes the crushing ache away, buries it beneath the exhilaration of the moment, beneath the relief of a long overdue desert thunderstorm and the presence of the little boy on his lap. Another streak of lightning splits the sky, and Dean counts Mississippi with Sammy this time.

It rains for three more days. The roads and washes flood; lightning scars scraggly Joshua trees around the mesa, blackens century old saguaros. The ground turns to mud, and the clouds hang so low in the sky that everything is cast in shadow, even at midday. On the third night of the storm, half the town loses electricity, including them. Dean digs his old storm lantern out of the locked kitchen closet, passes Sammy a flashlight. Sam stands behind him, his face peaked, his blue afghan tied around his neck like a cape.

"Dean, how come that's locked?"

Dean doesn't look at his brother as he re-locks the closet, jamming the heel of his hand against the door to make sure it is good and tight. He has a whole trunkful of incriminating evidence locked up in there: unregistered firearms, a homemade flame thrower, bottles of holy water, holy oil, silver bullets and silver tipped arrows. Tools of the trade once, Dean thinks bitterly. He pockets the key and turns to his brother.

"It's private, Sam."

"I can keep a secret, Dean." Sam blinks owlishly up at him. He flicks his flashlight on, trains it on Dean's shoulder. "You can trust me. I'm your brother."

"Drop it," Dean orders. He crosses the kitchen to the table, where he places the storm lantern and opens the shutters before turning it on, as bright as it can go. Sam watches curiously.

"That looks like the lantern from _Pete's Dragon_."

Dean cocks an eyebrow at him. "What?"

"_Pete's Dragon_. It's about a dragon." Sam skips over, swinging the flashlight wildly across the floor. "And Pete. I watched it at Brian's." He stops just short of the table. "How come you have that, Dean?"

Dean hesitates, then says, "Dad and I used it for camping." He shouldn't really call it camping, he thinks- long nights in dark forests, crouching in the underbrush for some creature; huddled on mountaintops in the rain and snow. He coughs. "Go get ready for bed, Sam."

Sam chews his bottom lip, casts fretful eyes towards the dark well of the staircase. "I'm scared, Dean," he admits in a small voice, and Dean sighs.

"There's nothing to be scared of, dude."

"It's just- it's too dark." Sam twirls the flashlight in his hands. "Can you come with me, Dean?"  
Dean picks Sam up and carries him the stairs, following the beam of light that Sam directs against the staircase and walls. In Sam's room, he sets his brother on the bed and fumbles in the dark for a pair of pajamas. It's cool tonight, thanks to the storm- too cold for sleeping mostly undressed, as they have every night for the past five months.

"You think it's gonna snow this year?" Sam asks from behind him and Dean chuckles.

"Don't hold your breath, Sammy."

"Huh?"

Dean laughs again. "Never mind. Here." He tosses the bundle of pajama pants and shirt he's found in the direction of the flashlight. He hears Sam giggle as it makes his mark. "Put these on. It's bedtime."

"It's too dark to sleep," Sam protests loudly. Dean rolls his eyes.

"It's supposed to be dark when you sleep."

"I can't. I'm too scared."

The flashlight drops to the floor and rolls. Dean follows it to Sam's toy chest and bends to pick it up. Behind him, the bed creaks and Sammy mutters something indiscernible. Dean trains the beam of light on him, watches him blink in the bright light. He has his t-shirt on not just inside out, but backwards as well. Dean grins.

"Sammy, man, who taught you how to dress?"

Sam scowls. "You did." He swings himself off of the bed and bundles his blue afghan into his arms. "I can't sleep now, Dean. There's stuff in the dark. Riley told me."

Riley doesn't know how right he is, Dean thinks. But that is something that Sam, at six years old, doesn't need to know. It might be something he doesn't ever need to know. Dean hasn't decided yet. He tightens his grip on the flashlight, makes a split second decision. "Get your pillow and come on," he instructs. "We'll camp out downstairs till we get the electricity back, okay?"

Downstairs, he tucks Sammy – and, at Sam's insistence, Iron Man- into one end of the couch and settles himself at the other end, the storm lantern at his side on the rickety nightstand that serves as their coffee table. He has a sheaf of papers, printed from his email- a manuscript Bobby came across in a library in Bleuville, Indiana; something else about a possible Opi-Ka-Yu nest outside of Topeka. "I'll keep quiet on it until you decide what you want to do," Bobby had said in the email. "But make a decision sooner than later. These things are going to move fast."

Dean sometimes wondered how the hell they had gotten to this point- going in cahoots with witches and supernatural creatures, exchanging promises of safety for examinations of his brother. The only person who hates it more than he does, Dean thinks, is Sam himself.

"Dean, are you scared of the dark?"

Dean looks up from his papers. Sam is watching him from the other end of the couch, fingers in mouth. Dean frowns. "No. Get your fingers out of your mouth, Sam."

Sam doesn't. "How come?"

Dean won't give him the real answer, that whatever is hiding in the dark, he has confidence that he can kill it. He stopped being afraid a long, long time ago.

That's not the answer a six year old needs to hear, however. He coughs. "There's nothing to be afraid of, Sammy. Get your fingers out of your mouth."

The fingers retract. Sam wipes them on his blanket. "Riley said-"

"Forget what Riley said, Sam." Dean feels himself warm. "Riley's just a kid. Who are you going to believe, me or him?"

Sam scowls. "You don't have to yell. I'm right here."

"I'm not yelling." But he was. He always does, when it comes to this. He takes a deep breath, lowers his voice. "I'm not, Sammy." Sam cocks an eyebrow at him, in that ridiculous way that he thinks his brother must have picked up from him. "Look, Sam, you think I would let anything to get to you?"

Sam shakes his head. Dean continues: "Then what are you scared of? Anything that wants to get to you, dude, has to go through me first, all right?"

Sam's lips twist. "They don't have a chance," he says with mock solemnity, and Dean reaches over to pull the blanket higher around Sam's neck.

"Damn right they don't," he agrees glibly. Sam grins at him, then stretches out, so his toes dig into Dean's thigh.

"I can't wait till I'm not afraid of anything either," he muses, and Dean wishes he would stop talking. There are a hundred or more things that Dean is afraid of, and they all center on him, around Sam and the future he may or may not have. Dean pushes that thought away. He'll get his brother back, if it's the last thing he ever does.

"Stop talking and go to sleep," he orders Sam, and Sam, to his relief, does.

When the rain finally stops the next morning, the ground is left a sodden mess. Dean has to step carefully to avoid sinking ankle deep into the mud. "There sure is a lot of water for a damn desert," Sam quips on their way to the car, and Dean swings a fierce look round on his brother.

"Don't use that word," he admonishes, and Sam rolls his eyes.

"_You _say it-"

"I'm an adult." Dean pulls open the backdoor to the Impala, watches impatiently as Sam scowls and steps purposely into every puddle in his path. "Sam, hurry up. We don't have time for you to screw around."

"I'm not!" Sam protests, but he leaps over the last puddle and scuttles into the car, his backpack banging Dean's side on his way in. "Dean, Mrs. Hobbes says that swearing is bad."

"It is." Dean waits a beat. "If you're six." He closes the door and slides behind the wheel of the Impala. Sam edges forward on his knees, rests his chin on the seat back.

"So when can I swear, Dean?"

Dean rolls his eyes. "When you're thirty," he answers, and Sam flops backwards into the seat. He traces a seam in the leather seat with one finger.

"Dean, did Dad take me camping too?"

The question catches Dean off guard. He backs out of the driveway, being careful to avoid the puddle glistening at the end, and puts the car into gear before he starts down the road. The surrounding desert looks different after the rainstorm- limp, heavy, mournful. He tightens his jaw and refuses to meet Sam's eyes in the mirrors.

"You were too little," he lies, and tries to ignore the way Sam's shoulders slump. Dean hesitates, then reaches over and puts the radio on. Motorhead rattles the speakers; in the backseat, Sam buries his face in his backpack and doesn't speak for the rest of the ride.

There's a call at work later that morning. It's Mrs. Hobbes, asking patiently if there is any way that Dean can bring another pair of sneakers to the school for Sam. Sam's drowned his in a puddle on the playground. "A change of clothes would be nice too," Mrs. Hobbes adds before she hangs up, and Dean dry swallows three aspirin to fend off his burgeoning headache.

Dean finds Sam at the school, sitting outside his classroom door on a chair. He is covered, from head to toe, in fine, dark mud; his socked feet bang a rhythm against the tiled floor. He smirks up at Dean.

"Do I get to go home?" He asks, too cheerily, Dean thinks. Dean shakes his head and shoves the plastic bag of clothes he's brought at him.

"Sammy- what the hell?"

"Me'n Riley were wrestling," Sam answers flippantly, then stiffens, realizing his mistake. "I mean- we were playing, Dean."

But it's too late. Dean grinds the heels of his palms into his aching eyes. "Sam- why can't you just listen, for once?"

Sam huffs. "I always have to listen to you," he says sullenly. He squeezes the bag of clothes tight to his stomach. "I'm sick of listenin' to you."

Dean grits his teeth together. "Tough," he replies, and watches Sam's face redden. There's a blow out in the works, he knows, so he bends and pulls his brother to his feet, propels him down the hall towards the boys' restroom door. "Get changed, Sam. Put your dirty clothes in there. And hurry. I have to get back to work."

Sam rolls his eyes and goes into the bathroom, being careful to slam the door as loud as he is able to. The sound echoes down the hall; Dean fights against the urge to go in there after his brother and call him out on his bad attitude. But this is a school- you're not supposed to go around shouting at little kids in school. Dean leans against the wall outside of the bathroom and nods politely to teachers passing by. Sam, as Dean thought he would, takes his time getting changed.

When he finally comes out, Sam hands Dean the bag of muddy clothes without saying a word. He didn't bother to wash his face while he was in there, and there are patches of mud drying on his cheeks and neck. His brown curls are flat and stringy. Dean takes the bag and ties it off.

"Does Mrs. Hobbes have your sneakers?"

Sam looks down at his feet, clad now in his red rubber rain boots. "We couldn't get 'em out of the puddle," he answers, then sticks out his lower lip. "Riley got to go home."

There isn't room in their budget for a new pair of sneakers. Dean closes his eyes, counts to ten. "Sam-"

"How come I can't come home?" Sam demands. He sniffles loudly, runs the back of his hand across his nose. "Riley's mom took him out of school."

"I have to go back to work," Dean points out. He has no idea where Sam is running with this idea, or why he's getting so worked up about it. "You know that."

Sam rolls his eyes. "Whatever," he says, and stomps away into the classroom before Dean can reply.

He makes Sam shower as soon as they get home that evening. Sam goes without any response, then shuts himself in his room until dinner. When he comes down to eat, his eyes are puffy and red. Dean hands him his plate of food before asking, "What's wrong?"

"Riley got to go home early today," Sam says in a quiet voice, and Dean feels his earlier headache returning.

"Sam, you know why I can't take you out of school," he says. "You know I have work." Sam nods miserably; Dean hesitates, then plows on: "And you know what I said about that wrestling shit. I told you to knock it off."

"I didn't hurt him," Sam mutters. He reaches up to pick a noodle off of his plate with his fingers. "It's just play wrestling, Dean."

"It's Riley," Dean points out. "Since when do you ever _play _with Riley?"

Sam shrugs. "Sometimes he's just the only kid that will play with me," he says, and Dean's stomach flops. Sam dangles the noodle in front of his face, slurps one end into his mouth. "They got this game they play called 'Firemen.' All'a the girls stand on the jungle gym and pretend their house is burning up, and the boys got to rescue them." Sam looks over at Dean, his eyes hooded. "Me'n Riley don't like that game," he finishes softly, and Dean has to look away from his brother. He has to push back those memories, lock them back beyond the wall that they've sat behind for twenty six years. Has it really been that long?

Dean clears his throat. Sam is still looking at him, he sees with a start. Still looking, waiting for him to say something to make it better, to fix the hurt. That's what he does, doesn't he? Isn't that what big brothers are for?

Dean reaches out a hand, rests it atop Sam's head. Sam stills at the touch. "Listen, Sammy," Dean says, "Those kids- they don't mean anything by it, okay? They don't know."

Sam shrugs one shoulder. "It's okay," he lies. "I don't care."

He does care; Dean knows he does, just like he knows it's up to him to make this better somehow. He hesitates, ruffles Sam's hair. There's still mud in it. "Hey- look, Sam, I have an idea. I have to go to Show Low tomorrow for parts. How about playing hooky and coming with me? We can get you new sneakers then too."

Sam looks at his dinner plate, but his eyes are gleaming, just like Dean knew they would be. "Can we have McDonalds for lunch?" He wheedles, and Dean makes a show of rolling his eyes and groaning.

"Dude, their burgers aren't even _real_."

"Please, Dean?" Sam slides off his chair and clasps his hands on Dean's knees. He does that ridiculous puppy dog imitation that Dean can't ever deny. "Please?"

McDonalds isn't in their budget; neither is a pair of shoes. He's not even supposed to make the run into Show Low until Friday, but Tim will understand. Sometimes, Dean thinks, as he pulls Sam into his lap and tries to eat his own dinner around his suddenly lively brother, things just don't go as planned.

It's a two hour and forty minute drive to Show Low. Dean makes the trip once every three weeks, to the auto parts warehouse there. It's faster than waiting for something to be shipped, and it's cheaper too. And Dean doesn't mind making the drive; he likes cruising down the interstate with his windows down and the radio blasting. It's at those times that he comes as close to feeling what he used to feel - that freedom, that wild abandon. It's easy to forget that his brother is a first grader, that his father is dead, that he's nothing more than a grease monkey in a garage that doesn't even take credit cards.

He doesn't usually take Sam on trips like this, but every once in a while, there are exceptions. He makes sure he gets up early to call the school, leaves a message on the answering machine in the office before waking his brother and getting him ready. Sam is bright eyed and energetic, excited for a day out with his brother. He talks without pausing for breath even the entire way to the garage, where Dean parks but leaves the engine idling.

"I've got to grab the list," he tells Sam, and Sam throws his seatbelt off in a hurry.

"I wanna see Tim," he announces, and slides across the seat after Dean. Inside of the garage, he makes a beeline for the office door and enters without bothering to knock.

"Hi, Tim," he says cheerily. Tim smiles at him from behind the desk.

"Hey, Sam." He nods at Dean, then stands to reach over Sam's head and pass him the list of parts, the company checkbook. "I heard you had an accident at school."

Sam reaches up to finger the shiny pink scar above his eyebrow. "That was a long time ago," he says dully. "Me'n Dean are going t'Show Low, Tim." He pauses. "Do you have any popsicles?" he asks, and Dean groans, pulls his brother away from the desk by the hood of his sweatshirt.

"It's eight in the morning, Sam," he interjects. "You don't need that kind of sugar this early." Sam tilts his head back, rolls his eyes.

"_Fine_," he huffs, and Tim chuckles.

In the car, Sam buckles himself in and waves out the window at Tim, who is opening the bay door, as they pull away. He offers Dean a wide smile. "I like going on trips, Dean," he says, and Dean grunts.

"I'm going to remember that in an hour when your whining," he says, and Sam sighs.

"I don't whine, Dean," he objects. "I'm not a baby."

"Sure you don't," Dean says evenly. He pulls off of the main strip, onto the empty Route 117, and opens the throttle.

It's an easy ride, and Sam, Dean is surprised to see, is calm. He sits in his seat, clutching Iron Man between his two hands, and drums the heels of his feet against the edge of the seat. It's more comforting that it is irritating, so Dean lets it go.

"Dean, my feet are sweaty," Sam complains an hour into the trip, and Dean sighs. Sam's still wearing his rain boots, and though it's cooler than it's been, it's still too warm to be comfortable in rubber boots.

"Take them off," he says, and Sam leans forward, straining against his seatbelt to pull his boots off. His socks aren't matching.

"Dean, we're gonna start the put together letters tomorrow," Sam informs him. "We finished all the regular letters."

"Put together letters?" Dean asks, and Sam nods.

"Like when some letters go together their sounds are different." He pauses. "Mrs. Hobbes says it's the beginning of reading, Dean. I can't wait to read. I already know some put together letters."

"Like what?"

Sam crinkles his nose. "Like- S-A-M. That's Sam. And D-E-A-N. That's Dean."

Dean chuckles. "Sammy, man, those aren't-" he fumbles the sentence, "-put together letters. They're just letters. They're regular words."

"But they're all put together," Sam justifies softly, and Dean bites his lip.

"But when they're all separate, when they're just letters, they all sound the same as they do when they're in the word. Put together letters are like – like E-R, err. Or like T-H. Thhh."

Sam's face is furrowed in concentration. "But D-E-A-N is put together," he says, "Because all you say is 'E' an' you don't say the A."

His brother's always been a smart kid. It's the one thing that continues to impress Dean, that hasn't changed this time around. He allows himself a grin in Sam's direction. "You're right," he says, and Sam beams with the praise. He twists Iron Man's arm in a full circle, thumps his elbow against the door panel.

"I told Mrs. Hobbes about counting the thunder," he tells Dean. "An' she said that when we get to learn about storms in science that maybe I can teach it to the class." He grins suddenly. "Maybe you could come teach it to my class, Dean."

The last thing he wants to do is be showcased in front of a bunch of six year olds. He shakes his head. "Nah, Sammy, that's all you. You can probably teach them better than I can."

Sam sighs. "Okay, Dean-o," he agrees, then brightens. "Hey, Dean, maybe you could be a teacher," he says, and Dean bursts into laughter.

"What?" he asks, and Sam turns warm brown eyes on him.

"You could be a good teacher, Dean," he says softly. "You're smart. You teach me everything."

Dean sobers. He doesn't know quite what to say, so he reaches over and tousles his brother's hair. "Me?" He says with a crooked grin. "A teacher? With a room full of kids? Dude, I can barely stand _you._"

Sam knows he's joking. He giggles, pushes Dean's hand away. "You could be one when you're done being a mechanic," he offers, and Dean thinks suddenly that when he's done being a mechanic, it'll only be because he's fixed Sam- and when that's done, he's blowing this town, this desert, and he's never staying in one place again.

He doesn't know why the idea bothers him so much. On the seat beside him, Sam is watching him with serious eyes. He ignores the questions he sees there and turns the radio on. Guns'n'Roses roars through the car.

"Sing with me, Sammy," he instructs, and Sam does.

Sam's good mood ends fifteen miles outside of Show Low, just like Dean knew it would. By the time they pull into the parking lot at the warehouse twenty five minutes later, Sam has already cried about having to put his boots back on, about having to keep his seatbelt on, about having to wear his sweatshirt. Dean parks the car in the lot between a pick-up truck and a van and feels the raw edges of his patience bristle.

"Sam, we're going to be quick, okay? Then we can have lunch."

Sam scowls. "I'm hungry now," he mutters, and takes his time sliding out of the car, makes a show of slamming the door. Dean watches him impatiently from the end of the car.

"Sam."

"I'm coming, I'm coming." But he isn't. Sam bends down to pick at something on the asphalt. Dean stuffs the checkbook and parts list into his back pocket, sweeps Sam off of the ground, and settles him against his hip. He doesn't have time for this, he thinks to himself, and Sam pushes at Dean's chest with one hand and Iron Man.

"Put me down, Dean," he demands, and Dean stops on the sidewalk in front of the warehouse. He puts Sammy on his feet against the wall, crouches down, takes his brother's chin in his hand. Sam pushes at his hand; Dean catches it, stills it.

"Look, Sam," he says, "Let's have a good day today, okay?" He shakes Sam's chin a little. "A _good_ one, all right?"

Sam hasn't really done anything yet, Dean thinks, besides whine a lot. It's been a good morning, but that can end in a second. Sometimes, Sam changes moods like someone switching on and off a light. One trick Dean has learned over the last year and nine months is that pre-emptive measures are often the best ones. Sam glares at him a moment, then deflates.

"Okay, Dean," he agrees, and Dean scrubs his hand through Sam's hair, releases a sigh of relief.

"That's my boy," he murmurs, and Sam catches ahold of his hand as he stands, grins.

"That's me," he agrees, and Dean shakes his head wryly as he pulls open the door and steps into the lobby. There's a couple of guys in line at the counter- men that look like him, he realizes with a start, all of them in faded jeans and boots, with black rimmed fingernails and calloused palms. A few nod at him as he enters, smile at Sam, who has been drawn immediately to the vending machine in the corner. He tugs on Dean's hand, turns those ridiculous puppy dog eyes on him.

"Dean, I'm hungry," he says mournfully, and Dean sighs as he digs in his pocket.

"You've got to stop looking at me like that, dude," he reprimands his brother, but there's no heat in his voice. He peels a dollar out of his wallet and hands it to Sam, who takes it with a grin and skips over to the machine. He scrutinizes the contents through the glass, leaning in so close that his nose bumps it. Dean can hear him talking to Iron Man.

"Dean, I can't reach the buttons," he calls, and Dean sighs, crosses the room, punches the buttons that Sam points to. A bag of Cheetos falls out in the slot, and Sam crows as he digs his hand into it. He hands the bag to Dean to open, then grabs it back just as quickly. "Dean, my legs are tired," he says, and Dean rolls his eyes but picks him back up, settles him against his hip and goes back to line.

"Want a Cheeto, Dean?" Sam asks, and stuffs one in Dean's mouth before he can answer. "Want another?" Dean shakes his head, chewing – he hates Cheetos- and someone ahead of him in line chuckles at his expense.

By the time they reach the counter, Sam's face and Dean's shoulder are coated in orange Cheeto dust and Iron Man is digging a bruise into Dean's rib. He puts Sam back on his feet, wedges him between his knees and the counter. "Be good for a minute, okay?" He says, and Sam rolls his eyes, knocks his fists gently against the sides of Dean's knees.

"Okie dokie, Dean-o," he agrees, and Dean turns his attention back to the bored looking teenager behind the counter. He hands him the list, waits patiently while the kid scrolls through something on the computer.

"We got everything but the cylanoids for the Chevy," he tells Dean in a nasally voice. He waits while Dean scrawls off a check, then nods at the door in the wall behind him. "Go on through there. Greg'll help you out."

Greg is the one Dean usually deals with, and he's grateful. He doesn't say it aloud, but sometimes all these people – these bored, ignorant, run of the mill civilians- grate on him. He hoists Sammy back into his arms and goes through the door.

Greg is a short, black haired Asian man with glasses. He smiles at Dean. "You're a few days early," he says by way of greeting, and before Dean can reply, Sam bobs his head.

"We got to get sneakers today," he informs Greg, and Greg smiles at him.

"Is that so?"

"I got mine lost in a puddle." Sam scrunches the empty Cheeto bag into a ball in his hands. "They got stuck. We couldn't get 'em out."

Greg chuckle again, takes the list from Dean. "You guys got the brunt of that storm down over there, I heard," he comments, and Dean nods.

"Lost power for a night," he says. Sam is kicking him; he puts him on the ground, takes the empty bag from him, hands him Iron Man. "Don't touch anything, Sam," he warns, and Sam nods rapidly, his hair flopping into his eyes.

"I know, I know."

Sam loose in a warehouse full of car parts, Dean thinks, is potentially catastrophic. He fixes Sam with a hard look. "I mean it."

"I _know,_ Dean." Sam glares back. "I'm not a baby."

That's Sam's rebuttal for everything**. **Never mind that Dean has never actually called him a baby. "Sam."

Sam ignores him. He crouches, sticks his finger in a crack in the cement floor. "You think this is from a earthquake?" He asks, and Dean rolls his eyes.

"Come on, man."

Sam trails a few steps behind them as they make their way through the warehouse. Dean keeps one eye trained over his shoulder, on his little brother, the other eye on the mounting pile of car parts and boxes Greg is loading onto their pallet. Greg talks idly about the weather, the Cardinals; behind them, Sam is telling Iron Man about put together letters.

Finally they're done. Dean breathes a sigh as they step out into the sunlit parking lot. It's appallingly warm out; Sam immediately tries to slither out of his sweatshirt. "Dean," he whines, and Dean bends down, untangles Sam's head and arms, fixes his brother's t-shirt. Sam blinks at him. "Can we get sneakers now?" He asks, and Dean hands him his sweatshirt.

"I thought you wanted lunch first."

"My feet are sweaty."

Dean puts Sam back into the Impala, then helps Greg pack the trunk with the merchandise. When he finally slides behind the wheel of the Impala, Sam has already taken off not just his rain boots, but his socks as well. Dean groans. "Sam- put your boots back on."

"But my feet are sweaty, Dean."

Dean sighs and lets it be. At the shoe store, he forces Sam's feet back into the socks and boots and carries him inside. Finding Sam sneakers is the easiest chore of the day: Sam locates another pair exactly like the ones he had before- bright red Converse sneakers, the kind that lace up past his ankles. Sam likes routine, likes things that don't change or fluctuate. His wardrobe is apparently one of those things.

Back in the car, Sam wastes no time in kicking off his boots and cramming his feet into his new sneakers. He scuttles across the seat, drops his feet into Dean's lap. "I can't do the laces, Dean," he says, and Dean laces and ties them off. Lacing the sneakers is a process, because Sam can't sit still for shit, but it's worth it to watch Sam grin.

Sam takes his feet back, runs one finger around the shiny white rubber toe. "It's so white, Dean," he says with awe, and Dean nudges his foot.

"Try not to drown these ones, okay?" They cost more than he should have paid. He could have taken Sam to the Salvation Army, gotten him something cheaper- but every time he considers it, he remembers another Sam, twenty three years ago crying because he had to wear hand-me-downs _again_, and the extra money is suddenly easier to let go of. He coughs. "You hear me?"

Sam grins at him. "Okay, Dean-o."

They go to McDonald's, where Sam sets Iron Man up on the table next to him, leaning against his Happy Meal box. He lays a nugget in front of his action figure. "There you go," he says encouragingly. "Eat up." Dean reaches across the table, taps Sam's head.

"Dude, _you _eat up," he orders, and Sam stuffs a handful of fries into his mouth and chews loudly. He has a SpongeBob figure in his box; he rips it open, sets SpongeBob next to Iron Man and places a fry in front of him. Dean opens his mouth, but Sam catches sight of him and cuts him off:

"I'm eating, Dean, I'm eating."

The traffic is thicker leaving Show Low than it was coming in. Dean rolls the windows down, dangles his arm out of it. On the seat beside him, Sam yawns, tipping his head back and screwing his eyes shut. Dean glances at him, recognizes the heavy tilt to his head, the sluggish blinks. "You want to nap, man?" he asks, and Sam considers the question.

"I guess so," he replies. He wiggles around underneath the seatbelt until he is on his side, his new sneakers planted against the door panel and his hair brushing the sides of Dean's thigh. Dean rests his hand on Sam's chest, feels the soft patter of his brother's heart through his t-shirt. "Close your eyes, Sammy."

Sam does. "Can you put on my music?" he asks haltingly, and Dean reaches over to flip through the station until he finds that soft jazz one Sam likes. He turns it down so it's background rhythm and puts his hand back on Sam's chest.

"That better?" He asks, and Sam nods sleepily.

"Thank you for my new sneakers, Dean-o," he whispers drowsily, and Dean chuckles.

"Dude, you don't have to thank me. I'm just doing my job."

Sam smiles softly, though his eyes remain shut. "I like your job," he says, and Dean looks ahead, focuses on the car in front of him through the sudden blur in his eyes.

The next day Sam can barely get in the front door before he is ripping his homework folder out of his backpack, dumping it open on the kitchen table.

"Look it, Dean," he demands loudly. He flaps a piece of paper at Dean, who takes it, studies it with aching eyes. "We started the put together letters today!"

Sam's excitement is overwhelming. He slides off of his chair and runs to the drawer under the counter, where he pulls out the tape dispenser. "Put it up now, Dean!"

Dean takes the tape, cuts off a few pieces, sticks the picture where Sam points to. The wall is a smorgasbord of color and creations, dozens of different papers covered in Sam's wobbly handwriting. He tries hard not to think about the first time that he saw this penmanship- twenty three years ago on the back of a notebook, hidden under the seat of the Impala. The first word Sam had ever said had been "Dean"; it was the first word he ever wrote too.

Sam tugs on his arm. "We got a lot of pictures up, Dean."

Dean shakes himself. Another memory, he thinks, for another time. He looks down at his little brother. "Yeah."

"We could put some of your pictures up if you want," Sam offers genuinely.

"I don't have any pictures, Sammy." Dean tousles his brother's hair and crosses to the counter, where he puts the tape dispenser away and sticks a pot under the running faucet. "What do you think- spaghetti tonight?"

Sam doesn't answer. When he looks over his shoulder, Dean is surprised to see a tremble to his little brother's face. "Dude, what's wrong?"

Sam shrugs one shoulder. He looks down at his feet, at his new sneakers. "I just wish you had some pictures too," he says softly, and Dean turns the faucet off and crouches in front of his brother.

"Sammy," he said, "You don't have to feel bad about that. I don't mind. I like your pictures." Sam sticks his fingers in his mouth; out of habit, Dean reaches over, plucks them out. "Okay? I had pictures when I was a kid. It's your turn."

"How come you didn't save any?" Sam asks, and Dean swallows against the lie in his throat.

"I just- I didn't. It didn't really matter to me." There wasn't any room for any of his stuff, he thinks, not when there was so much of Sam's that he wanted to save.

"How come you save all mine?"

Dean shrugs. "I don't know, man. I just like them." He pokes Sam in the stomach, eliciting a giggle from him. "I like you. Okay?"

Sam laughs. "Okay, Dean." He dodges Dean's finger again, scrambles around his brother. "Dean, can I put the sp'getti in?"

Dean rises, answers, but his mind is a hundred miles away. Someday, when Sam is older – whether it be sooner or later- he likes to think that Sam would like to have something to remember this by. Not everyone gets to be a child twice, and as much as Dean abhors what's happened here, something inside of him reminds him daily that he had better make the effort to do this right this second time around.

Sam is invited to stay over Brian's house Friday night, and Dean agrees. Brian is a good kid – one of the few Dean likes – and he doesn't get into a lot of trouble, which Sam is sometimes prone to do. Sam goes home with Brian after school, and Dean works late at the shop. He's in the hole, after paying for the new window and the new sneakers, and when Tim offers him a few hours of overtime, he knows he would be a fool not to take it.

The house is quiet without Sam. It's after eight when he gets in, and he showers and makes himself a few sandwiches for dinner. He fishes the popcorn out of the cabinet out of habit, then realizes what he is doing and puts it back. Their weekends are structured now: popcorn and movies Friday night, chocolate chip pancakes Saturday morning, ice cream on the porch Sunday afternoon. Dean's day to day existence is tied up in Sam- it always has been- and he feels suddenly lonely and unbalanced without his brother there.

His phone rings a little after nine, just after he's settled onto the couch with a beer and Jurassic Park. He flips it open without looking at it. "Hello?"

"Hi, Dean." It's Sam. He sounds bright and happy- giggling. There's background noise. Dean sits up.

"Sammy? You okay?"

"I'm okay." Sam sounds out of breath. "Dean, I just wanted t'tell you about- um, Jurassic park is on TV. It's your favorite. Mrs. Z said I could call to tell you, in case you wanted to see it." Sam pauses, laughs at something. "Me'n Brian are gonna watch it. Are you gonna watch it?"

Dean chuckles. "I've already got it on, man."

"Okay. It could be like us watchin' it together." Sam says something to someone else, then speaks into the phone. "Okay, um- I got to go, Dean. Mrs. Z made us some brownies with sprinkles. You want me to save you one?"

Dean laughs softly. "No, I'm good."

"Okay, Dean. You're gonna pick me up tomorrow, right? So we can have lunch at the diner?"

"Yeah."

"Okay, Dean."

"Sam-" Dean feels stupid. He wishes Sam would stay on the phone another minute. "Sam- you be good, okay?"

"I am, Dean."

"Listen to Mr. and Mrs. Z, okay? And- don't stay up too late."

"We got to go to bed at eleven, Mr. Z said," Sammy offered. "And I'll be good. I even helped with dishes."

Dean smiles softly. "Good boy," he says, more to himself than anyone else, and Sam tells him good bye and good night and hangs up. Dean sits with the phone in his hand and listens to the house echo the silence back at him.

Watching Jurassic Park without Sam is weird. Doing anything, he realizes with a little disdain, without Sam is weird. He turns off the television half way through the movie and goes to bed, where he spends a few hours surfing the usual sites. But he lacks the vigor that he used to have. There are less leads to follow up, less discoveries to be had. They're down to the basics: mediocre witches and shamans and a few others fumbling in the more obscure magics. It's been one year and ten months and they still have nothing.

Dean doesn't realize that he's fallen asleep until his phone startles him awake. His alarm clock's green digital face proclaims the time at 2:42 AM. Dean blinks sluggishly at it, fumbles his phone open in a stupor.

"'Lo?"

"Dean?"

He recognizes the voice immediately. Sleep falls away in a blur; Dean sits up, twisting in the sheets. "Rand?"

Brian's father is, among other things, the town sheriff. It's probably one of the reasons Dean feels safe with allowing Sam over there. Dean clears his throat. "Rand?"

"I'm really sorry to wake you, but we've got a problem." There's no panic in his voice, so Dean takes that as a good sign. He forces his heart to a standstill. Someone is crying in the backround-

"What's wrong?"

"Sam- he, he had some sort of nightmare, I think." Rand's voice is wryly apologetic. "We can't get him to calm down. He's been crying for about half an hour now and all he'll say is he needs you."

_He needs you_. Dean closes his eyes, leans back against the headboard. It's hot out. "Can you put him on?"

"Sure." There's a scuffling; the crying grows closer. Then it's full out sobbing over the line.

"D-D-Dean?"

"Sammy- man, what's wrong?" The crying grows louder, more dramatic. Dean can't understand a word Sam is saying. "Sammy, kiddo- listen to me. Listen, okay? Can you hear me?"

"Y-y-ye-yeah-"

"You need to calm down, Sammy. Can you do that for me? I can't understand you. Are you listening to me?"

It's doing no good. Whatever Sam dreamed, whatever has him spooked, it's got him more riled up than he's been in months. Sam's dreams and nightmares have always been vivid, realistic, even when they weren't foreshadowings or psychic premonitions. It's one of the things that hasn't changed about Sam this time around.

"Sammy. Sammy, you need to listen to me-"

"D-D-Dean, I'm, I'm-" Sam hiccups, takes a deep breath. Dean takes the opportunity to plunge ahead:

"Sam, it's just a nightmare, okay? It's not real. You're okay-"

"Dean, I'm too scared, I'm-I'm-"

"It's okay, dude. It's okay." Dean swings his legs over the side of the bed, plants his feet on the floor. He feels tense. "Listen to me- you listening? You're okay, Sam."

"Dean, can-can-can you come get me?"

Somehow, the minute he heard Rand's voice on the phone, he knew that this was coming. Dean sighs. "Sammy-"

"Please? I can't- I can't- I just-" Sam breaks off into another round of sobs; Dean closes his eyes, nods.

"I'll be there in a few minutes, okay, Sammy?"

"O-o-okay, Dean-"

"Sammy, give Mr. Z the phone back, okay? Let me talk to him." It takes some coaxing, but eventually Sam relinquishes the phone to Rand. By that time, Dean has his boots and jeans back on and is heading downstairs, flipping back on the lights as he goes.

"Dean, I'm sorry. You don't have to come all the way here."

"It's ten minutes." Dean swipes his keys off of the kitchen table, checks to make sure the back door is locked. "It's not a big deal."

"I'm sure if we just give it a few more minutes, he'll be okay."

Dean sighs as he steps out onto the porch, yanks the door shut behind him. The night is still and hot; the Milky Way seeps like a puddle overhead. "He- he has these nightmares once in a while," he explains. "He gets pretty worked up. I probably should have warned you."

Rand is silent. Dean is just climbing into the Impala when he asks, "Dean- was Sam in the car when your father was killed?"

Dean starts. He's cold suddenly, despite the exaggerated heat of the night. "What?"

"Sam- he would have been too young to remember, I suppose, if he was, but some of the things he said tonight…" Rand's voice is careful, cautious. "Children have ways of retaining memories before they are even aware what they mean, especially of traumatic events, and allowing them to re-surface later when they are older, more in control of their emotions and thoughts." Rand clears his throat. "Was Sam in the car when your father was killed?"

Dean feels as if he is suffocating. He lets the keys fall into his lap, clutches the steering wheel with one shaking hand. "What did Sam say?"

"Just- something about a truck, a semi."

Dean barely remembers that night. The idea that Sam might- that some of who he used to be, what he used to be is returning is a hope that Dean can barely afford to allow himself to have. He swallows hard. "Our father didn't die in the car. In the- in the hospital afterwards."

"Was Sam in the car at the time of the accident?"

If he closes his eyes, he can still sort of remember it: the glare of the headlights, the tangy taste of blood in his mouth, his little brother screaming amongst the crush and tangle of limbs and metal and glass and leather-

"Dean?"

Dean opens his eyes. With deliberate intent, he fits the key into the ignition, starts the car. "Yeah, Rand," he replies roughly. "Yeah, he was. We both were."

The roads are empty and dark. Dean makes the trip to the Zwiegf's house in just under eight minutes. When he pulls into their yard, the porch light washes their lawn with yellow shade. He kills the engine and crosses the yard. As he mounts the porch steps, there is movement behind the curtained window. He doesn't even need to knock before the front door is wrenched open and Sam lurches into him.

Sam won't look at him. Dean extricates his brother's arms from around his waist, pulls him into his arms. Sam wraps himself around Dean, buries his face in Dean's collarbone. He's shaking, a small bundle of nerves; Dean can hear him crying. He rubs the back of his brother's head, murmurs to him. "Sammy, Sammy, Sammy…"

Rand steps into the doorway. He is sleep rumpled but apologetic as he hands Dean Sam's backpack, his jacket, his sneakers. Behind him, his house is dim. "I'm sorry you had to come all the way here," he apologizes again, and Dean shakes his head.

"It's okay," he says, and Sam hiccups, his fingers digging into the back of Dean's neck. He winces. "He didn't say anything?"

Rand shakes his head. "Just woke up screaming bloody murder. Wouldn't calm down until we got you on the phone." He hesitates, then adds: "He mentioned- mentioned that accident, but that was it."

Dean desperately ignores the question in Rand's voice, on his face. He's not prying, Dean knows- he's concerned. When your son's best friend wakes up at a sleepover screaming like a banshee about the night his father was killed, it's bound to raise some questions. Dean swallows thickly, nods. Sam's grip is all but strangling him. "Thank you," he says, and he means it. Rand nods once, then steps back and closes the door.

Dean carries Sam across the yard to the Impala. His brother is featherweight, shivering despite the heat of the night, and when Dean opens the passenger door he whimpers, tightens his hold on Dean. Dean feels like a jerk, but he has to drive them home somehow, so he orders, sharper than he means to, "Sam- you need to get in the car, okay?" Sam withdraws but he is crying again- full out crying- and when Dean slides in behind the wheel, Sam glues himself to Dean's side once more.

Dean starts the Impala but doesn't move. The porch light flicks off and the yard, the road, is plunged into darkness. In the stark silver of the moonlight, he seeks out his brother's face, anchors it between his hands. "Sammy? Sammy- you okay?"

Sam shakes his head. There are tear tracks on his cheeks, his neck, his shirtfront. Dean uses the cuff of his shirt to dry them. Sam fights him, twisting his head away and burying his face in Dean's side. Dean lets him be, keeps one arm tight around him as he maneuvers the Impala away from the yard and down the dirt road.

Sam clings to him the entire way home but refuses to speak. There are a hundred things dangling on the tip of Dean's tongue. More than anything, he wants to ask Sam about the dream, about the accident, about the truck and their father. Does he remember? For the last year and ten months Sam has been ignorant – completely unaware – of anything that had transpired in the last twenty six years. Is that changing now? Dean wants to know what is safe to tell his brother, what to expect, what he can be allowed to hope for. There was always some idea that maybe this thing would just work itself out, wear off- is this the start of that? Dean can barely dare to believe.

But he knows that this is not the time to push it. Sam needs his comfort more than Dean needs his answers; Sam is still a ship lost at sea in a storm, and Dean is the one he needs to guide him to port.

So he carries his brother into their house when they reach it. He carries Sam up the stairs, to the bathroom, where he turns on the light and settles Sam on the counter. Sam fists his hands into his eyes and gives a thick, strangled sob. "D-Dean-"

"I'm right here, Sam." Dean turns on the tap, runs a washcloth under the cool water. He uses one hand to pry Sam's hands away from his face. "I'm right here, dude."

Sam's face is streaked with snot and tears, puffy and red and swollen. He screws his eyes shut against the light. "Dean-"

"Hold still, Sammy. Okay?" Dean wipes Sam's face with the washcloth, being careful to clean around his mouth and under his nose. Sam whimpers. "You're okay, buddy. You with me?"

Sam nods. His fingers reach out, curl themselves into Dean's shirt collar. "Dean-"

"You're okay, Sam. I'm here." He can feel Sammy's trembling. He continues his process with the cloth but uses his other hand to squeeze, gently, the back of his brother's neck. "It's just a nightmare. You know that. You're safe." Sam sneezes suddenly, hiccups. He opens his eyes and seeks out Dean's.

"Dean, I don't wanna sleep," he says thickly, and Dean lays the washcloth down, brushes the hair back off of Sam's forehead.

"You want to talk about it?" He offers, and Sam shakes his head, his eyes swimming again.

"My head hurts, Dean," he says in a small voice. Dean opens the medicine cabinet, removes the bottle of children's Tylenol, and shakes two tablets into his hand.

"Eat these," he instructs, and Sam plucks them out of his palm and pops them in his mouth. It's a testimony to how awful Sam must feel if he's that obedient about taking medicine. Dean fills a cup at the tap and hands it to Sam, who drinks it, slowly, sputtering.

When he's done, Dean lifts Sam off of the counter and turns off the bathroom light. "Ready to sleep?" he asks, and Sam stiffens in his arms.

"I'm not tired, Dean."

Dean knows it's a lie. He's dealt with enough of Sam's nightmares to know tactical aversion when he sees it. He steps into his own bedroom, deposits Sam gently on the bed. The clock on the nightstand reads 3:27.

Sam tries to climb out of the bed as soon as Dean puts him down, but Dean is ready. He lifts Sam back into the bed, forces him back down on the pillow, pulls the blanket back over him. Sam starts crying again. "I-I don't wanna-wanna sleep, Dean-"

"You're okay, Sammy." Dean kicks off his boots, his jeans, and climbs into the other side of the bed. He pulls Sam to him. "You're okay. I'm right here."

It's what Sam needs to hear, needs to know. He'll never be alone, not if Dean has anything to do about it. He waits for his brother's sobs to peter out, for the small chest under his palm to shudder to a standstill. He strokes back Sam's hair and murmurs to him until he is sure his brother is asleep, until his features have smoothed out in dreamless respite. Only then does Dean relax. He rests one hand on Sam's forehead, and when he sleeps, he dreams of his father.

The next morning breaks with another storm. It's the rumble of thunder that wakes Dean, twenty minutes before his alarm is due to go off. He lies in bed and watches the rain slide in sheets down the windowpane. His arm is stiff and numb with Sam's head on it.

He leaves Sam to sleep and stumbles into the bathroom, where he runs the shower cool and steps into it. He faces the spray head on and tries to drown his thoughts in it. He'll ask Sam today about the nightmare, about what he remembers, he decides- and then changes his mind. If Sam does remember, if this is something changing, it'll be apparent soon enough, won't it? As much as he wants answers, wants to press Sam for _something_, he hesitates at the thought of making Sam re-live his terrors of the night before. What's more important, he asks as he scrubs shampoo through his hair, his own piece of mind or Sam's?

Sam is stirring when Dean steps back into the bedroom. He blinks blearily at Dean from the bed, sniffling, rubbing a fist over his eyes. "Dean?"

Dean pulls on his jeans and sits beside his brother. "How're you feeling, dude?"

Sam shrugs miserably. He won't meet Dean's eyes. "I bet Brian thinks I'm a baby," he says softly, and Dean shakes his head.

"I bet Brian's had some nightmares of his own," he counters. "He'll get it, man. Don't worry about it."

Sam fiddles with the hem of his shirt. "Sorry you had to get up," he whispers, and Dean taps him on the chest, draws Sam's eyes to his own.

"Cut that out," he says sternly. "Don't you ever feel bad about needing me."

_I need someone to._

Sam hesitates, then nods. "Okay, Dean-o." He burrows down back under the blanket, wrapping it around his chin. "Can I go back to sleep now?"

There's so much more than Dean wants to say, but he acquiesces. "You want pancakes?" He asks, and Sam shrugs.

"Okay."

"You wanna come crack the eggs?" Dean offers, and Sam's eyes slide shut.

"No, Dean," he answers drowsily, and Dean, for good measure, tucks the blankets in under Sam before heading downstairs.

It's rare that Dean ever gets to prepare a meal alone, but it happens. Today, he cracks the eggs, sifts the Bisquick, stirs in the chocolate chips by himself. Sam likes to be the one who pours the batter into the pan- today, Dean does it alone and is slightly amazed that it is possible to make pancakes without completely trashing the kitchen in the process.

The pancakes are nearly finished when Sam comes tottering down the stairs, dragging his blue blanket behind him on the floor. He is wordless as he pulls himself into a chair at the table. Dean hands him a plate of food, and he struggles to uncap the syrup.

"Dean," he says, "We got another storm."

"I know." Dean sits across from him. Sam takes a bite of pancake without bothering to cut it. "You want help there, dude?"

"No, Dean." Sam chews, swallows, takes another bite. Dean sighs.

"Sam, let me-"

"Dean, I'm not scared of the storms anymore," Sam announces suddenly. He blinks over at his older brother. Dean coughs.

"You're not?"

"No. It's just a storm. That's what you said." Sam goes back to chewing his pancake like a dog, and Dean sits at the table, feeling suddenly like the opposite ends of two extremes: relieved, _proud _,because he is still, after all these years, the one that his brother trusts unquestionably; and pure, unadultered terror, because _he _is the one that Sam depends on. Sam's a smart kid, a bright kid, but there is a whole world of stuff that he either doesn't know or doesn't remember and it is for those things that he looks to Dean. Dean is his harbor, his cornerstone, his foundation- his big brother. Everything that Sam is, that Sam might be, that Sam could and will be depends on _him. _Dean isn't sure, as he never is, whether or not he is the right man for the job. The one reassurance he has is that Sam seems to think he is.

Sam eats half of his pancakes before pushing them away. Sam's moods are like light switches, and he has just been turned off. "Dean, do we gotta go to the shop?"

Dean sighs. "Yeah. Just for the morning, Sam."

Sam sniffles. He drops his chin to his chest. "Dean, I got a headache again."

Dean eyes his brother. "You want some more medicine?" He asks, and Sam sighs, his little shoulders heaving up and down.

"No, Dean."

Dean finds an ice pack in the freezer, wraps it in what he hopes is a clean dishtowel, and hands it to Sam. "Go lie down with this," he instructs. Sam slips off of the chair and presses it to his forehead. "Keep it on your head, okay?"

"I don't gotta go shower?" Sam asks, and Dean shakes his head.

"We've got half an hour before we have to leave," he says. "Go rest a little more, Sammy."

Sam does as he is told, climbing onto the couch with his blanket and dozing with the ice pack balanced atop his forehead. Dean does the dishes, pulls out meat for dinner, and goes upstairs to find clothes for Sammy. He half thinks about calling Tim and telling him he won't be in- he doesn't like dragging Sam around when he's like this- but he's not even sure yet if he'll be able to make the rent on time this month, so he discards the idea. Sam's just going to have to deal, he thinks grimly. They both will.

Sam is sluggish and slow to get moving after Dean wakes him. He is sullen in the car, and when they get to the shop, Sam curls into a ball in front of the television in the office and watches cartoons without any sort of enthusiasm at all.

The rain seems to have slowed down the rest of the town as well. There are relatively little interruptions while Dean works in the bay; outside, the road runs wet and empty the entire length of Main Street. He puts on the radio while he works but keeps it turned low so he can listen for Sammy.

He checks on Sammy a few times an hour. The first couple times, he finds Sam dozing on the floor. He turns off the television and covers him with that blue afghan Sam can't seem to be able to leave at home. He's got Iron Man clenched in one fist and his face is flushed. Dean feels his forehead for signs of a fever and is a little irritated to find it warm.

When Sam wakes up it is after ten and he is cranky. He stands in the doorway to the bay and glares at Dean. "I'm hungry."

Dean glances at him. Sam didn't really eat a lot of breakfast, he remembers. He nods towards the doorway. "There's an apple in your bag," he offers, and Sam's scowl deepens.

"I hate apples," he grumbles, and disappears back into the office before Dean can say anything else.

Dean finishes the truck a little after one and cleans up in record time. The rain hasn't let up and it is cool. He pokes his head into the office and grins at Sam. "Ready for lunch?" he asks, and Sam scrambles to his feet, knocking crayons askelter across the floor.

"Are we gonna go the diner, Dean?" He demands, and Dean crosses the room to cup his brother's face in his hands. Sam yanks away and Dean pulls back. Sam's face is warm to the touch.

"You feeling allright, Sammy?" he asks, and Sam snaps:

"I'm not a baby-"

"Just answer the question, Sam," Dean interrupts, and Sam sags a little. Dean releases him and steps back. "I think you have a fever."

"I'm _fine_." Sam's glare would melt stone, Dean thinks, if he weighed a little more than forty-three pounds. "You're always askin' me that-"

"You had a rough night, Sam," Dean reminds him. "I'm not trying to annoy you. I'm trying to take care of you." Trying being the key word, he thinks dismally. He crouches and helps Sam gather up the spilled crayons, the coloring books and Hotwheels cars. "If you're not feeling well, we should just go home."

Sam's face droops. He turns those eyes on Dean. "But we always go to the diner," he says in a small voice, and Dean thinks that one of these days, he's going to have to figure out how to say 'no' to that face.

"All right," he agrees, and Sam throws him a wild grin, scoops his back pack off the floor, makes for the door. Dean catches him by the arm as he blasts by, curtailing his rampage. "Put your coat on, Sam. It's raining." Dean watches while Sam wriggles out of his backpack and sticks his arms into the sleeves of his sweatshirt. Dean clears his throat, waits until he has Sam's attention, and adds: "And I don't think you look good, so if you start to look worse, we're leaving, you got that?" Sam nods timidly.

The diner is mostly empty, as Dean expected it would be. For people adapted to thriving off of a land that burns you if you look at it wrong, a rain storm is enough to shut down half the town.

They sit in a booth by the front window and order. Sam balances himself on his knees and scrutinizes his menu as if the words mean something to him. "Dean, can I have a coke?"

The last thing Sam needs, Dean thinks, is that sort of sugar. "Get juice, Sam," he says, and Sam's lips tug downwards.

"I always have to have juice," he grouses, and Dean settles him with a hard look.

"Sam."

"Fine, Dean, fine, fine…" Sam twists and scowls at something on the seat beside him. "Dean, where's Iron Man?"

"Probably in your bag." Dean looks up as the waitress, some young kid he doesn't recognize, approaches. "What are you having, Sam?"

"Dean, where's Iron Man?" There's a real franticness in Sam's face. He pushes himself to his feet; Dean snaps:

"Sam, _sit_."

Sam does, but his face is redder than it was before. The waitress is standing awkwardly beside them, waiting with her pen poised over her writing pad. Dean forces a smile at her, orders his usual burger and fries, and when Sam says nothing, orders chicken fingers and fries for him. The waitress pockets her pad and leaves. Sam looks out the window and refuses to talk.

Dean thinks that maybe he should cancel their order and take Sam home before he blows up or throws up or something. He doesn't like the way Sam looks, flushed and sleepy and sick. He knows his brother, knows his limitations and his quirks and everything about him. He's made a lifetime out of learning all he can about the kid in front of him. He knows when something is off with Sam, and right now, something is off.

When the waitress comes back with their food, Sam picks at his fries but refuses to touch his chicken. Dean sighs. "Sam, you need to eat more than that," he admonishes lightly, and Sam huffs.

"I hate chicken, Dean," he mutters. "Why did you order it for me?"

Dean shrugs, but he can feel his shoulders tense. "You didn't tell me what you wanted, man. I can't read your mind."

"You _know_ I hate chicken."

"You always eat chicken here, Sam," Dean points out, and Sam kicks the booth seat suddenly, his face dark.

"I hate chicken," he snaps. "I always tell you that. I _always _do. You're stupid if you can't remember." He glares at Dean, and Dean is just angry enough to look past the flush on his brother's face, to remember that sometimes, sick or not, Sam's still just a kid, and there are lines that Dean can't allow him to cross.

He settles his burger on his plate and fixes Sam with a fierce look. Sam matches it with one of his own, but it is faltering, as if he realizes what he's just done. "Did you just call me stupid?" He asks harshly, and Sam breaks his gaze, looks down. "Am I being rude to you, Sam?" He demands, and Sam sniffles.

"Dean-"

"Am I?"

Sam shakes his head miserably. Dean finishes, as sternly as he can without shouting, "Then you have no reason to be rude to _me_, Sam. You got it?"

Sam nods. His face is red and his eyes are red and he won't look up. His lip trembling, he says tearily, "I'm sorry, Dean. You're not stupid."

He might be, Dean thinks wearily, for letting it get to this point. Sam looks really bad, and Dean decides in that second that enough is enough. He waves the waitress over. "Can I get the check?" he asks, and Sam looks up at him.

"I'm still eating, Dean," he says pitifully, and Dean raises an eyebrow.

"You can finish at home," he says, and Sam sniffles loudly. There are tears in his eyes.

"My head hurts, Dean," he whimpers, and Dean sighs.

"Yeah," he says. "I figured."

Sam grows more unruly during the short ride home, and he is all but unmanageable when they get in the house. He squirms the whole time Dean takes his temperature – one hundred point three- and cries when Dean makes him take medicine. Dean lets him cry; sooner or later, he'll either wear himself out or the medicine will kick in, and he'll be pliable enough to deal with then.

"Let's get some sleep, dude," Dean suggests, and Sam reacts as if Dean has just asked him to jump bleeding into a shark tank.

"I don't want to sleep, Dean-"

"Sammy, you're sick." He carries Sam into his bedroom, tumbles him onto the bed. Sam's already gotten rid of his sneakers and jacket. Dean helps him change into his pajamas, listening with ringing ears to Sam's pleas and tears.

"I'm not tired-"

"Oh, well." Dean tucks Sam under the blanket; Sam pushes it off. "Sam, stop it. You're sick. You need to rest or you can't go to school on Monday."

Sam flops onto his stomach, buries his head in his pillow, and cries. Dean sits behind him and rubs his back. "Just sleep for a little while, Sammy. You'll feel better." Sam mumbles something into the pillow. Dean lifts him up. "I can't hear you, dude."

"I'm scared to, Dean."

The admission twists sharply in Dean's stomach. In the haze of dealing with a sick, cranky kid brother, Dean's completely forgotten about last night. He lays Sam gently on his back and brushes the hair off of his forehead. "You want to tell me why?" He asks softly, and Sam grabs at Dean's hand, squeezes it between his own. His breathing intensifies.

"Dean, I – I- just- I don't want another bad dream," he says, and Dean feels sick. He remembers another Sam, one who drank espresso like water to fend off sleep; popped pills to ward off nightmares. He remembers the agony of watching his little brother tear himself to pieces, watching him cave in and collapse on himself and being unable to do anything, unable to be anything other than utterly useless. He will never, he thinks fiercely, stand by and watch that happen again. He cups Sam's face between his hands.

"Sammy," he says, "You can tell me about it. Okay?"

Sam shakes his head. Dean continues: "It's scary, right? You don't want to think about it because it scares you but, kiddo- if you don't think about it, it doesn't go away. It doesn't make it any less scary." If someone had told him three years ago that he would be begging Sam to talk to him, he would have laughed in their faces. What was his mantra then- no chick flick moments? It's amazing, he thinks suddenly, how very much his day to day interactions with Sam now depend on those.

Sam's mouth is trembling. He looks away, but his little fingers tighten around Dean's wrist. Dean hesitates, then says, "Mr. Z told me you were talking a little about Dad, Sam."

Sam's eyes dart to his. He gulps. "Not Dad, Dean," he whispers. "You."

Dean's throat closes. He coughs, wipes at a strand of tears trickling down Sam's cheeks. "You know I'm not going anywhere, right?" When Sam says nothing, he adds, "Whatever was in your dream last night, Sammy, just remember- it's only a dream. It's not real."

"I heard you talking t'Tim," Sam says suddenly. "About when- when you got in a accident, with the truck." His eyes search out Dean's. "Dean, I didn't know you had a accident too."

Dean remembers the conversation suddenly. In a moment of lighthearted joking, with Tim and him peering into the motor of the Impala, he'd said: "Wouldn't even tell we were scrap meat for a semi, huh?" He hadn't known Sam was listening.

"It was a long time ago, Sammy," he says, but Sam's face won't lose that look, that panic. "Look, Sammy- I'm okay, aren't I? I'm here."

"Dean, was it- was it the same accident as Dad had?" Sam asks in a stilted voice, and Dean wishes he would shut up, wishes he would never ask that. He doesn't want to answer, and more than that, he doesn't want to abolish this hope smoldering in his chest.

"Sammy…" But Sam has a right to know. John was his father too, wasn't he? More than that, he knows that Sam has already lost so much, without ever even realizing that he had it in the first place. He fleshes an answer out of the burgeoning hole in his chest. "Yeah, Sammy. It was."

Sam sniffles. "Did you almost die, Dean?" He asks, and Dean wraps his hands around Sam's. His brother doesn't deserve to be lied to, he thinks, but then- he doesn't deserve to be burdened with that fear either. He's six years old, and he deserves what every six year old deserves: happiness, carefree abandon, safety and resiliency and trust that his big brother is going to do right by him every time, no matter what.

"Sammy," he says, "listen to me, okay?" He waits until he is sure that he has Sam's undivided attention, then plunges on. "You don't ever have to be afraid that I'm going to leave you, or that something is going to happen to me. That's not your job to worry about me, man. I worry about you and I take care of you and you- you just be a kid, okay? You go to school and you play with your friends and you get into trouble or whatever, and you do it without being afraid, every day, that something bad is going to happen. You can't let yourself be afraid of everything, Sammy. That's no way to live."

Sam sniffles again. "I just didn't know you had a accident, Dean," he says again, and Dean brushes Sam's hair out of his eyes with trembling fingers.

"We've all had accidents, Sammy," he says. "Bad things happen to people every day, but you know what? You don't let that stop you. You hear me?"

Sam nods. "Okay, Dean-o," he says softly. His eyes are drifting shut. "Dean, my head still hurts."

"You want me to get you some ice?" Dean asks, and Sam nods sleepily. Dean goes downstairs to get the icepack, and when he comes back up, Sam is already asleep. Dean leans on the doorway and watches him sleep, knocks to the back of his mind the already greying hope he's foolishly carried since three a.m. Sam doesn't remember a thing, he thinks, and he still doesn't have a fix.

One calamity melts into another. When Sam wakes up several hours later his fever has spiked. Dean feeds him some more medicine and runs the tub full of cool water. When Sam emerges from that, the flush on his face has given way, but his temperature hasn't budged.

Sam wants to go outside, which strikes Dean as an odd request, but he denies it. He makes Sam sit on the couch and watch television instead. "Want a popsicle?" He asks, and Sam takes one with little enthusiasm.

"I'm hungry," he announces. "Can I have my fries?"

Sam hasn't puked yet, but Dean's not pushing his luck. "You keep some toast down and we'll talk fries later," he bargains, and Sam huffs loudly.

"Never mind," he says dramatically. "I'll just starve to death, I guess." He looks back at the television, then at Dean. "Where's Iron Man?" He asks, and Dean sighs.

"In your bag," he says. He fetches the backpack from where he had dropped it next to the front door earlier, and tosses it at Sam. "Here."

Sam unzips it and tears through it. Dean watches panic blossom on his face. "Dean, Iron Man's not here." He drops his popsicle on the couch and up ends the backpack. Toys and notebooks and crayons scatter and roll across the floor. Dean snatches the bag from his brother with a glare.

"Stop it," he says shortly. "He's here, Sam-"

But he isn't. Iron Man, that stupid red and gold action figure with the bendable knees and arms that pivot all the way round, has gone where Sam has gone, every day since the second time he turned five and Dean gave it to him. To Sam, losing Iron Man is like losing a limb.

Dean puts the bag on the couch next to Sam and picks up the popsicle before it can melt into the upholstery. Sam watches him with accusing eyes. "I _told _you he wasn't!" He cries. "Where did you put him?"

"Where did _I _put him?" Dean echoes, crosses the room to the sink, drops the melting popsicle in it. "I'm not the one responsible for keeping track of your things, Sam. That's your job."

Sam looks crushed. "But I'm your job," he said softly, and Dean closes his eyes, grinds his hands into his eyes. This was one of those big brother things he was supposed to fix, he saw. When, he thinks, does someone get to help fix _me?_

When he opens his eyes, Sam is still staring at him. He sighs. "I'll find him, Sammy," he promises, and Sam chews his lip.

He distinctly remembers seeing Sam with it at the shop earlier- or did he? He can barely remember. These days, everything runs together in one long blur. He goes out to the Impala, hunts around with a flashlight under the seats and in the glove compartment and for good measure, the trunk. There's nothing, and when he comes in empty handed, the fear on Sam's face is so raw that he balks at it.

He looks through Sam's room: empties the toy chest, under the bed, in the closet, in his drawers, even between his mattress and box spring, where he finds a picture that Bobby took before they left him, of Sam and Dean on the hood of the Impala. Sam has Iron Man in his lap and Dean has Sam in his. Dean puts the picture back where he found it and goes to search the rest of the house.

He's not in Dean's room, or the bathroom, or the hall closet. The kitchen and living room yield nothing as well. He even, at Sam's insistence, goes so far as to take the flashlight and crawl underneath the back porch, though he tells himself grimly that if he finds _any _of Sam's toys under here, he's going to go back inside and smack his little brother, fever or no fever. There's nothing under there, not even the snakes that Dean is so scared of finding in the dark, and when he goes back inside and tells Sam that he has no idea where Iron Man, he has never felt like a bigger failure.

Sam cries himself to sleep. Dean tucks him in, rubs his back. "Sammy, we'll look again tomorrow," he promises, and Sam sobs harder. "Look, dude, if we can't find him, I'll get you another one, okay?"

Sam looks at him fiercely. "I don't- want- another one!" he says loudly. He hiccups. "I just want mine."

"It will be yours-"

"But you gave me him, Dean, remember?" Sam grabs his arm; Dean nods, pulls from Sam's grasp.

"I remember, Sam."

"I just want him, Dean. I –" He breaks off crying, and Dean pushes him back down on to the bed, rakes his hand over his head.

"It's okay, Sammy," he soothes, and Sam cries even harder.

When Sam finally falls asleep, it is almost nine. Dean leaves him and goes back downstairs, where he decides that the mess of Sam's backpack can be left for tomorrow. He draws a beer from the fridge and sits on the couch and stares mutely at the television until a knock on the door startles him. When he opens the front door, he is even more surprised to see Tim on his porch.

Dean blinks. "Hey," he says, and Tim grins wryly, pushes his hat back off of his forehead and takes from the pocket of his coat a red and gold plastic figure.

"Found this under the desk in the office," he says with a small smirk. "I see the way that brother of yours carts this thing around and figured that forgetting something like him would mean a five alarm fire for you."

Dean takes the action figure from Tim, chuckles. "I could kiss you right now," he says brusquely, and Tim laughs heartily. "Man, you couldn't have gotten this here a couple hours earlier? Sammy just drowned himself to sleep in his own tears." Tim laughs harder, reaches over and claps Dean on the shoulder.

"Well," he says, "Now you can go play hero to that kid of yours, right?"

Dean keeps his face neutral as he nods and calls good night to Tim, but he can't stop the warmth from spreading inside of him. _You can go play hero to that kid of yours, right? _

Dean takes the stairs two at a time. Sam is sleeping soundly in his bed, one hand pressed underneath his cheek, the other dangling off of the bed. Dean hates to wake him, especially when he knows he's still sick, but it's worth it for the small scream of delight Sam gives when Dean drops Iron Man into his hands.

"You found him!"

Dean laughs. "You left him at the shop, Sammy. Under the desk."

Sam scrunches his nose. "Oh, yeah," he says casually. "I remember now." Dean rolls his eyes and groans loudly.

"You couldn't have remembered earlier, dude?" He asks, and Sam shrugs.

"Sorry," he says in a very unapologetic way. He snuggles back down under the covers at Dean's insistence, Iron Man tucked under his chin.

"Thank you for finding him, Dean-o," he murmurs sleepily, and Dean bends, presses a kiss to the top of his brother's curls.

"Don't thank me," he says gruffly. "I'm just doing my job, Sammy."

Sam's fever is broken by the next morning, and he is back to his regular rampaging self. He plays in the mud outside and tracks it all over the kitchen; he spills spaghetti-o's at lunch time and cries because his new sneakers are dirty. He plays baseball with Dean in the backyard and loses the ball to a particularly thorny patch of prickly pear growing just beyond the fence. That night, they sit on the front porch to watch the sun sink down over the edge of the sky. Dean sips a beer and Sam slurps noisily on a popsicle and Dean takes a minute to appreciate the beauty of the moment. If there is one thing that he has learned, living the life that he does, it is that it is absolutely necessary to take care of these times. They're short lived, he thinks as he watches Sam lick green popsicle juice off of his wrist, and he's damn lucky to have them at all.

On Tuesday, Dean has to take Sam from school early to the clinic, because he's rammed chalk up his nose so far that they can't get it out. He sneezes white powder for the rest of the afternoon and sulks when Dean scolds him about it. The following week Dean has to sit with the principal because Sam's sneaked into the girl's restroom, and the week after that there's a food fight in the cafeteria that Dean isn't surprised Sam got in the middle of.

The calls from Bobby have less to do with solutions, less to do with leads or the hunt, and Dean doesn't press the issue. He has other things to worry about: rent and bills, Sam ripping his last pair of jeans, Sam struggling with math homework. He'll find a fix, he tells himself, but in the meantime, there are other things he has to fix, like the back porch door and the Chevy in the shop and the scrape on Sam's knee.

There has always been something of Sam's that needs fixing, and this time around is no exception. When Sam comes to him with a splinter stuck in his palm, he knows how to handle it. He soaks the area, tweezes the splinter out, soothes his brother's crying. Sam is still as Dean cleans and band-aids it, then whispers, "Thanks, Dean-o."

"Don't thank me-"

"I know, I know, you're just doing your job." Sam rolls his eyes; Dean nudges him.

"Smart ass."

"Do you like your job, Dean?" Sam asks suddenly, and though the question catches him off guard, the answer doesn't. He smiles at his little brother, who smiles tentatively back.

"Yeah, Sammy," he says, "I do."


End file.
